In The Way
by Thobbit
Summary: It's the first time Gabriel's seen his big brother in centuries, but it's just the same as last time.


Gabriel was sitting in a tree, chatting with a few of the local gods as they kept an eye on their worshippers' harvest. They were simple beings, of stone and stream, but for the couple days his family had been in the area, he'd gotten along with them. It was almost a pity his family were there to supplant them, inevitable though that was. Father was clear about it. From his seat among the branches, Gabriel could see Father's newest Prophet, Ezekiel, preaching to some female humans in the village. Already the man was learning how best to convert. So far as Gabriel could tell, the trick was not to confront those bearing weapons, or even the curved, sharpened rocks the humans were using to dig up plants in the field below.

The sun came out from behind a cloud, and Gabriel waved to the goddess in it. It seemed every village hereabouts had a different god in their sun, though of course Gabriel knew all those gods were just pretending. Father had made everything, after all. But that didn't mean it wasn't warm and pleasant, so he spread his wings in the light and leaned back with a happy sigh, letting chatter of gods and humans wash over him. Traveling was so much fun, much more interesting than sticking around the boring temple back home all day. Father said it wasn't time to spread around the world yet, so Gabriel barely got to explore at all. Mostly, it was just keeping an eye on the humans and weapons training with Michael.

Or, to be technically accurate, hiding from having to do weapons training with Michael and getting one of his littler brothers to watch the humans so he could go... watch other humans, usually, but it was much more fun when it wasn't a chore.

A cloud passed over the sun and he reached up and blew it away. The bright goddess smiled at him for clearing her view, and sent an extra ray of light down to his face. Gabriel caught it and wound it around his head, like the halos the humans so liked to give him and his brothers in their art. He wondered if they could bring this sun back with them when they returned to Israel. It wasn't as if she'd have anywhere else to go by the time they left, and she was nice.

Suddenly the ground started rumbling, and Gabriel's tree shook so much he nearly fell out. The little gods looked around in alarm, River stopping halfway through a description of a monstrous fish that'd swum through him yesterday. All the humans in the field dropped their tools and fell to their knees in terror.

"Hello, Lucifer," Gabriel said brightly, greeting his big brother with a smile that Lucifer didn't return. Instead, he waved his hand and yanked the tree out from under Gabriel, roots and all, and flung it across the field.

The humans cowered. Some hid their faces in the dirt, while others looked up to their sun goddess for succor. But she was hiding behind a cloud again.

"Lucifer, what's wrong?" asked Gabriel, hovering in front of his brother. To the human eye, if they had chosen to appear, they would have looked almost identical. Gabriel had liked the look of a younger human for his vessel, one who smiled brightly all the time, but Michael had insisted that he was one of the elder angels and so should have a grown warrior for his vessel. Father had supported the order, so Gabriel had taken a cousin of his elder brothers' vessels' clan.

"Everything," answered Lucifer angrily. "This whole cursed excursion."

Gabriel knew better than to explain why excursions were fun. Lucifer was less boring than Michael, but he was absolutely no more inclined to frivolity. "We need more people," he pointed out instead. "Father said so."

"People." said Lucifer, and the disgust in his voice sent shivers up Gabriel's vessel's spine.

"Yes, people," he said defensively. "We need their worship, don't we? Or at least we should save them from the false gods, who will lead them astray." He was repeating things he'd heard Ezekial say, or possibly the last Prophet. There was always another Prophet.

Lucifer could tell. "Don't you ever think for yourself, Gabe?"

"I do!" Gabriel replied hotly. "I mean, I obey Father's orders. And Michael's." One of Fathers orders was not to bear false witness, so he added, "Usually."

Lucifer sat down and patted the ground next to him invitingly. Gabriel looked at him sideways, suspicious of a trick––it had happened before––then sat, furling his wings.

"But don't you ever think about it?" Lucifer asked persuasively. "I know you're bored at home––Father knows I've covered for you at Weapons Practice more than once, though I don't think he's told Michael. Don't you ever wonder what it'd be like to go off and, I don't know, do what you want to do?"

Gabriel studied his brother. Was this a test? Sometimes Father liked to test the humans, and it was always Lucifer who was sent out with the temptation. (Sometimes Gabriel felt jealous of that, but Thou Shalt Not Covet.)

"No?" he ventured safely.

Lucifer looked at him with almost as much disgust as he'd stared at the humans in the field. Gabriel cringed. "I should have known. You're as weak as the little ones. Call yourself an archangel, Gabriel?" He pointed to the sky, calling down a wind to swirl around them. Then he sent it raging towards the field where the humans were still on their knees.

Before Gabriel could tell them to stop, the little gods of the place sprang to their feet and threw up a shield around their people. The wind broke upon it, making Lucifer even angrier.

"Lucifer, stop!" shouted Gabriel, pulling his brother's arms away from his sword. His brother's moods had been more changeable recently, but he didn't think he'd ever seen the elder angel like this. "Don't! They're just protecting their worshippers, you can't––" He broke off, not really sure what Lucifer was about to do.

Lucifer looked at him with an expression of pitying contempt. "We're here to _take_ their worshippers, Gabe," he explained as if to a small child. "This isn't a vacation for you to make friends."

Gabriel went for the argument of last resort. "Father commanded us not to steal. We don't take, we convert. With love. Father _commanded _it."

It was the wrong argument. The ground shook. The winds roared. The cloud was forced away from the sun, bringing sudden warmth to the fields and reflecting brightly off of Lucifer's suddenly drawn sword. But the light was utterly incongruous with the twisted expression on Lucifer's face. "I. Do not CARE. What FATHER COMMANDED!"

"Please," Gabriel whispered among the thundering winds, standing between his brother and the field when humans and small gods alike were crouching in fear. He drew his own sword, a match to Lucifer's but somehow far less fearsome. "Lucifer, don't."

Lucifer's eyes were hard with contempt and anger, but his voice was gentle. "Humans are filthy, weak, and despicable. We keep trying to prevent them from being 'led astray', but the truth is, the only way to get them on the right path, our path, is to kill all your little false gods." He reached up and pulled the sun goddess down from her star, to land in the dust with the others. "Then the humans will go and invent more, because they will never appreciate us for the glory that we are. They are too blinded by their 'inventiveness', their 'perseverance.' By their own putrid _waste_."

Something told Gabriel that Lucifer wasn't talking entirely about the humans anymore. He stood still, in the ready position Michael had drummed into all their heads.

The brothers locked gazes. "Are you really going too fight me, Gabriel?" Lucifer asked softly. "Over putrid waste?"

For just a moment, the winds stilled. Gabriel felt the warmth of the sun on his back, though it no longer belonged to the goddess. Not when she had been so cast down.

He lowered his eyes, and then his weapon. "No," he said equally softly, and stepped out of his brother's way.

Gabriel sat on a bench he'd made by the edge of the motel parking lot, staring out at the empty highway. It's been millennia since that day in the field, since he'd last seen his older brother. Since they'd last talked, at least, because everyone had been required to attend when the Cage was lowered into the depths.

They'd all known the day was coming of course. It was part of the Plan. Dad had said so. But still Gabriel had been unable to meet Michael's eyes, the both of them certain that if he'd just stayed there, in the way, Lucifer would've come to his senses and they could've stayed a family.

That was the day he'd vowed to run away, he remembered, though he didn't leave for another couple decades. Figuring out how to hide his Grace, watching the humans and lesser gods (those that were left, a number that got steadily smaller) and learning how to blend in. Then one day after a particularly awful training session with Michael, he'd just slipped out of his vessel and...left.

"_This is about you being too afraid to stand up to your family."_

That was all he had to do again, today. Kali had his blood, sure, but it was only borrowed from the human he'd been wearing for the past couple centuries. He always made sure they reproduced before he approached with an offer of holy possession, so there would be fresh one out there somewhere. The Apocalypse was going to be really abruptly _now_, once Lucifer got his hands on the moose, but there was still enough time for a couple beers and girls before the fireworks began.

He could even give the ladies some extra hands. Screw Kali. She could get killed if she wanted. The Moronchesters were doomed anyway, so no loss there.

_"Maybe those freaks in there aren't your blood but they are your family."_

He'd bowed out of this fight centuries ago. Michael and Lucifer could go at it like cats and dogs if they wanted. He'd be in the Bahamas, messing with locals until it all went up in flames. Then he'd toast marshmallows.

_ "But you still give a crap about 'em, don't you?"_

No one had caught him like that in centuries, before tonight. And when the Winchester had him in a holy fire circle. It was a pity to lose those two. They were so much fun to mess with. And they were even more screwed up––well, no, they were _exactly_ as screwed up as his own family, and that was the point. That was the point of everything.

_"Are you really going to fight me, Gabriel? Over putrid waste?"_

_ "No."_

Michael had blamed him for stepping aside, and he'd blamed himself, but maybe for the wrong reasons.

Well fuck.

"Luci!" He announced his presence with a blast of wind, shoving his brother back through the ballroom doors and away from the fallen goddess on the floor. "I'm home!"

Lucifer stumbled to his feet. His vessel was starting to crack, but the leaking power only made him more unstable. More dangerous. He stomped back through the doors, glaring at Gabriel, at the defenseless people on the floor, at the world at large. His mouth was still twisted with contempt, eyes alight with angry flame.

Gabriel stepped into his brother's way, blade raised in a guard position. "Not this time."


End file.
